


August Dreams

by Val Mora (valmora)



Category: The Great Escape (movie)
Genre: Claustrophobia, Gen, M/M, New Year's Resolutions 2005, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-07-03
Updated: 2006-07-03
Packaged: 2017-11-28 00:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/668200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/valmora/pseuds/Val%20Mora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny dreams of the tunnels, and Willie is there to wake him up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	August Dreams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kaydeefalls](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaydeefalls/gifts).



Danny has never been one to dream. Even when he was a child, when his two sisters would tell him of the train rides they had been on, the conversations with Cleopatra they had had, while they slept, Danny could tell them nothing but, "I did not dream."

He wishes, now, that he were still so blessed, for now he dreams only of the war and of digging.

The war is not so bad, because it is only his friends, his men, dying, and they do not come to haunt him like he has heard from others. His men do not accuse him of failing them, because they are not restless shades. Perhaps it is because they knew that they risked dying, or because he did not waste their lives, or because he dreams only in Polish and none of these Allied forces speak a word of his native tongue. He dreams only of watching planes fall, of the skirmishes that he won and the one he lost, of the strange cold detachment when his plane was shot down and he expected to die in the crash but did not.

Worse by far are the dreams of digging, of the earth that presses down on him in a living man's coffin thirty feet deep. It is all he does while waking, and now even sleep, filled with tunnelling in the darkness, is no respite.

He wakes every morning with his muscles aching like he has just been working and feels little better than when he collapsed on the mattress scant hours ago, hot and sticky with the summer heat and desperate to escape the fear he feels in his sleep.

By August, he is regularly dreaming that the tunnel falls in on him, and this night is the worst of all - he opens his mouth to breathe, and all is earth, tastes of earth rather than air, and his lungs burn. In the heavy darkness, he begins to struggle in the direction he thinks he can hear Willie trying to guide him out by voice alone, but there is no way to tell which way it truly is, and he knows that the way he faces is doubtless the wrong -

"Danny!"

Now there is the light of the moon through the window and, more importantly, air - and he is taking great heaving lungfuls of it, Willie standing next to his bunk as a reminder of his wakefulness, of his safety. Even with this comfort, though, his heart still beats a panicked rhythm in his chest and his nerves still jitter with fear and adrenaline, his hands shaking and his senses scared into sharpness. He still feels the dirt pressed rough against his shoulders, feels it scratchy in his eyes, griming his hair, blackening his face until he blends in with the tunnels as though he has never been above the ground. He is, even as he lies in his bunk, still buried thirty feet down.

"Danny!" Willie says again, trying to get his attention.

"What?" He turns his face to look at Willie's earnest expression.

"Are you feeling all right?" And there is concern in Willie's eyes, as well as fear - fear that Danny will go the way poor Ives did, crack and go mad and charge the walls only to be mowed down.

"No," Danny says, because it is the truth. "I was dreaming of the tunnels."

Willie grants him a scared, unconvincing smile. "Best that I woke you up, then," he says, and it sounds more strangled than optimistic.

Danny agrees, "Yes," but his voice is flat and the word is hardly accord, if it is anything at all.

Willie shifts his weight faintly away from Danny's bunk, anxious, but even so, his gaze stays locked to Danny's. "I'll just - be getting back to sleep, then," he says, but he doesn't begin to climb the step ladder. "Will you be all right or do you need to talk for a while or - ?"

Danny thinks of the shadows pressing phantom touches against his skin, heavy and waiting to clog his lungs, before he forces the sensation away and responds, "I'll be fine," but then continues, "What was that joke again? The one with the two sheep."

Willie isn't really fooled, but he tells it anyway, sitting on the bunk beside Danny and his voice staying deliberately steady and reassuring, occasionally flashing insecure smiles at him. It's appreciated, even if the joke isn't all that funny, and seeing Willie smile because Danny chuckles is worth it. Willie worries about him, and the best Danny can do to repay that kindness is to laugh at a few bad jokes.

"You feeling better now?" Willie asks after an awkward pause when he has finished, leaning closer to Danny in honest concern, his shoulders sweat-slick from the summer heat in their cabins.

"Yes," he answers, and does not lean away. If there is one thing that the tunnels have taught him, it is that being close to people is far better than being close to buried by the earth, and the best to be close to is Willie, who is the most comforting of anyone in those tunnels. If Danny is to die there, buried by the dirt, he would prefer that it be in Willie's hearing range - then, he would not panic as he suffocated, only wish that he could see Willie, or better yet, touch him, or best of all, be safe beside him.

"Remember that if you need anything, I'm right above you," Willie says, laying a scalding-hot hand on Danny's arm, and Danny nods dumbly. Willie smiles then, for real, and leaves to climb the stepladder, Danny's eyes following him until he spills onto the bunk above and is out of sight.

When Danny lies down and falls asleep, it is not of digging deep into the earth that he dreams, but of being buried against Willie's body, torchlight flickering faint across his skin and banishing the fear.


End file.
